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Victims of August 20 car explosion in Tatarstan identified

A criminal case was opened on the counts of preparations for a terrorist act
Photo ITAR-TASS
Photo ITAR-TASS

KAZAN, August 21 (Itar-Tass) —— Victims of a car explosion in Tatarstan on August 20 have been identified, a source at the Tatarstan Department of the Russian Investigation Committee told Itar-Tass on Tuesday.

“Citizens born in 1985 and 1988 died in the explosion of a vehicle on the motorway in the Zelenodolsk district of Tatarstan. One of them was a citizen of Tatarstan, and the other was a resident of the Tyumen region. They had been lately living in Kazan. Both were radical Islamists,” the department said.

The blasted vehicle was found two kilometers away from the village of Novochuvashskoye in the Zelenodolsk district, not far from the Zelenodolsk-Kazan federal route, in the night of August 20. Remains of presumably four people and a Kalashnikov submachine gun were found on the radius of 50 meters around the explosion scene.

Experts estimated the explosion power at no less than one kilogram of TNT. They also said that the bomb exploded on the vehicle. There is a theory the men were planning a terror attack.

“Investigators presume the explosion occurred in the making of an explosive device. Investigative procedures are underway to find out details of the incident,” the department said.

A criminal case was opened on the counts of preparations for a terrorist act conspired by a group of individuals (Article 30 and Part 2 of the Article 205 of the Russian Criminal Code), and illegal buying, selling, storing or transportation of weaponry conspired by a group of individuals (Part 2 of the Article 222 of the Russian Criminal Code).